Walking Into the Night

by Olaf Olafsson

As butler to William Randolph Hearst at San Simeon castle, Christian Benediktsson lives quietly, almost invisibly. He completes his tasks efficiently and with aplomb, catering to the whims of the volatile Chief and overseeing the running of the hectic household. Privy to the goings-on of the celebrity guests who visit as well as to Hearst’s intimate relationship with his mistress, the actress Marion Davies, he is the picture of discretion. An extremely private man, those around him know nothing of him or his life. And so it is in his thoughts and in unsent letters to his wife back in Iceland that we witness the unraveling of his former life, which began when he abandoned her and their children for an actress in New York City. Once a successful businessman, he erases his past and himself after a sudden tragic death and his financial ruin, the result of a jilted lover’s vengeance. Walking into the Night is a stunning portrait of a man wrestling with guilt and secret passions.

Genres: Fiction, Historical Fiction, Novels, Contemporary, Scandinavian Literature, Literary Fiction

265 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 2001

About the author

Olaf Olafsson was born in Reykjavik, Iceland in 1962. He studied physics as a Wien Scholar at Brandeis University. He is the author of three previous novels, The Journey Home, Absolution and Walking Into the Night, and a story collection, Valentines. His books have been published to critical acclaim in more than twenty languages. He is the recipient of the O. Henry Award and the Icelandic Literary Award, was shortlisted for the Frank O’Connor Prize, and has twice been nominated for the IMPAC Award. He is the Executive Vice President of Time Warner and he lives in New York City with his wife and three children.
http://www.facebook.com/olafsson.author

Reviews

[Jenny (Reading Envy) · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read this book in my attempt to read more Icelandic authors, but the majority of the novel is set on William Randolph Hearst's property in California. The main character works for Hearst as a butler. Half of the book is his letters to his wife, who he abandoned in Iceland with the children, taking their money.

The story is told in a somewhat circular way between the letters and the present-day drama that I felt disconnected from both, and in the end you are merely where you started somehow.

[Laura · Rating 4 out of 5]

I can't actually say the synopses any better than what is on the back:

For twenty years Christian Benediktsson has led a quiet life as William Randolph Hearst’s butler. His days are filled with the rituals of Hearst’s life and the demands of running a grand house. But in his most private thoughts and memories, he relives another life: his abandonment of his wife and children in Iceland for an actress in New York, a reckless affair and a tragic death, financial downfall, and the profound retreat from life that led him to Hearst’s San Simeon. No one else knows the secret of the man he once was—husband, father, businessman, lover—and, ultimately, even he will choose to forget that this person ever existed.

I can only add that I loved the sparse but resonating chapters of a life left abruptly and a secret life now lived in another country. There are fond remembrances, regrets, a reckoning of Christian's decisions. A realistic ending and very, very good. I will look for more of this author's books.

[Chris McArdle · Rating 3 out of 5]

I found this difficult to get through, and could never identify with the main character, Christian/ Kristjan. I kept hoping for him to snap out of his daydreaming and do something, anything. Perhaps some like this type of character study, but it wasn't for me.

[Brynhildur Stefánsdóttir · Rating 4 out of 5]

yndisleg bók og sagan margslungin, hlustaði á hana í storytel og naut upplestursins, ÓJÓ hefur einstakt lag á að koma frá sér fallegum texta.

[Sanja_Sanjalica · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wonderfully written, full of little details and introspection, a quiet but powerful book.

[Kari · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very difficult first half to get through and satisfying to finish.

[Kristín Hulda · Rating 4 out of 5]

Falleg og tregafull. Mjög ljóðræn og mikið af fallega skrifuðum texta, sérstaklega hreyfðu sum af skrifunum til Elísabetar við mér.

[Elsa Termato · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took me a while to understand how essentially dislikable the main character is. This unfolds slowly through the seesawing storytelling. He marries up and gets handed a business to run but quite deliberately undermines both opportunities. Seems even not that into the lover. He certainly treats her with little sympathy. Yet in the role of butler to a fastidious and controlling master he is in his element. He shows kindness and consideration to underlings and even the master. When that world is threatened by his past he walks away again. The letters he writes imply he seeks forgiveness but when given the chance for some redemption through meeting his son he walks into the night again. Ok he was ashamed. But why did he walk away the first time? Was the reason for all that waking away explained? If so I missed it. 3.5 stars from me.

[Proustitute (on hiatus) · Rating 3 out of 5]

Olaf Olafsson's Walking into the Night will draw inevitable comparisons to Kazuo Ishiguro's The Remains of the Day, both of which have butlers as their protagonists. While both deal with conflicted manservants' inner anxieties and failures in the midst of a changing global crisis—Ishiguro's novel focuses on the build up to the Second World War in Britain whereas Olafsson's focuses on the years just prior to this in America, emphasizing more the Depression's impact on celebrities—they are very different in their treatment of their protagonists' inner lives.

Stevens, in The Remains of the Day, has reflections about his childhood, but his anxieties and stalemates are located uncannily in his place of work. By contrast, Kristjan's reflections are of a lost world that is no longer available to him geographically or emotionally, except in dreams and memories. I could say more about the two novels' similarities and differences, but I suppose that would then see me repeated the critical move of joining the two so simply and irrevocably. I think that any novel that has a male butler as its protagonist, especially given the brilliant portrayal of Stevens's conflict by Ishiguro, will always be compared to The Remains of the Day. Ishiguro has, in essence, created a subgenre all his own, then.

To return to Olafsson:

Kristjan is unfailing at his duties as Chief Hearst's butler, but his nagging conscience, the mistakes that he has made in the past, his regrets and his isolation (not least of which is underscored by his choice to move from Iceland to California, from a job of power to a job of service) soon interfere with his typically by-rote existence at the San Simeon castle.

In stark, spare, and unrelentingly gutting prose, Olafsson shifts the point of view here in a way that gives the reader increasing glimpses into the interior life of his main character, and then by turns to Elisabet, the woman whom he has left behind and to whom he writes letters he will never send. The idea of confession is very intriguing here: how the person to whom Kristjan feels he must confess is the one person he will never see again.

Bleak but beautifully imagined, Walking into the Night is a meditation on love, loss, and the myriad regrets we make as we go on about our lives. Olafsson is a master at rendering place, especially outdoor scenes, and also in insisting on how tiny gestures (the closing of a door, the gathering of blossoms, a finger tracing a lover's spine) can convey the emotional and psychological states of people more succinctly and accurately than words can.

[Maggie · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a beautifully written historical novel is set in the 1930s. Most of the story takes place at San Simeon, California, but the memories of the protagonist, Kristjan, take the reader back to Iceland and on journeys to New York, as well. The vast majority of the book is written from Kristjan's point of view, mostly in the form of letters written by Kristjan to his wife, Elisabet, and they slowly and circuitously give the reader the information on Kristjan's life before coming to San Simeon. For me, that part of the book was most effective and affecting. I was in the moment with Kristjan, even though as the pages increased I grew less and less sympathetic to him. There were a couple of instances in the book where the view suddenly changes to Elisabet's life, and I found that part of the book much less interesting, though she had my sympathy. It felt as if the editor had imposed that on the author in order for the reader to get the story of life back home. I didn't need that story, knowing that the Roaring Twenties had lead to the Great Depression, with worldwide ramifications, I could figure out how things would have gone. Further, the same information could have been easily included in the letter from Hans Thorstensen, which occurs at the end of the book.

That having been said, I thoroughly enjoyed this book because it reminded me of the two trips I've made to San Simeon and as Kristjan walks around the house and grounds I was right there with him. The complexities of lives of Kristjan, Elisabet, and Klara, and of William Randolph Heart and Marion Davies were many, varied, and felt true to life. Recommended.

[Betty · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed the poetic language in this book, the cast of historical characters, the era between the world wars, and the bold freedom of the protagonist. His faults and introversion as well as his accomplishments and polite charm aggravate and awe the reader. For reasons probably only the protagonist knows, he surprisingly leaves his Icelandic family and the family's profitable business for a New York romance before taking on the job of butler to William Randolph Hearst. In California, the reader meets Hearst and Marion Davies. Though Davies makes more than an appearance in the novel in relation to Hearst, the Wikipedia article better illustrates her film career. The book's themes range from flying like a bird and drawing birds to persistent memories and reinventing oneself. Mention of the book's title comes on page 143:

"I couldn't say goodbye to you. I couldn't bring myself to. still less did it occur to me to lie to you about my intentions. I left during the night while you were all asleep. Walked out into the darkness before dawn, stepped into it, vanished."

He steps into darkness, into fire, into a new life. With his wife, his adult son, with his tycoon employer, he would evade discomforting truths. At the same time, his assertive actions can and do save the day more than once. Memories catch up with him, motivating his unsent explanatory letters, until word of his heroic butler's deeds reaches the characters who want to find him.

[Ása · Rating 3 out of 5]

Eftir að hafa lesið Sakramentið langaði mig að lesa fleira eftir Ólaf Jóhann. Nú hafði ég mig loksins í það og varð Höll minninganna fyrir valinu. Sagan fjallar í stuttu máli um Kristján Benediktsson sem fer eina nóttina frá konu sinni og börnum heima á Íslandi. Hann flytur til Bandaríkjanna og hefur að lokum störf sem þjónn hjá bandarískum auðkylfingi.

Sagan fór fremur hægt af stað og það tók mig smá tíma að venjast stíl höfundar. Sagan er sögð út frá nokkrum sjónarhornum og mikið er um ljóðrænar lýsingar. Ég gat samt ekki hætt að lesa þar sem mig langaði að fá svarið við því hvers vegna Kristján fór frá fjölskyldu sinni. Samúð mín lá ekki með Kristjáni en ég skildi hvers vegna hann gerði það sem hann gerði. Mér fannst mjög áhrifamikið að lesa kaflana sem sagðir voru frá sjónarhorni fjölskyldu hans.

Heilt á litið fannst mér bókin áhugaverð og spennandi á vissan hátt. Það gerist þó ekki sérstaklega mikið í henni. Ég mæli með þessari fyrir fólk sem hefur unun af því að lesa fallegan texta og hefur áhuga á hátterni fólks.

[Jeansue Libkind · Rating 5 out of 5]

Since reading the author’s brilliant The Journey Home, I’ve wanted to read more from him; this was no disappointment. Again we have an unapologetic person examining long-ago decisions. Christian is not a likeable man; he has left his wife and children in Iceland and come to the US for the love of an exotic dancer, an equally unlikeable character. Left alone, he finds his solace at San Simeon, running the estate of another unlikeable character: William Randolph Hearst. With no one around to win Ms/Mr Congeniality, Olafsson pins his story on connecting the threads between past and present while juxtaposing two men of similar self-interest, whether they are building a business, jettisoning a family, or blind to all but a woman. Of course, if one has money, one is merely eccentric; without funds, one is an outcast.

[Carol · Rating 5 out of 5]

I started reading this as part of a push to read as much about Iceland as possible before a trip. And then had to set it aside because of the trip. But once I was home again, I couldn’t put it down. I had read The Long Journey Home first and really wasn’t a fan of the protagonist. The main character in this story was every bit as complicated and lacking in insight to his own behavior, and yet I found myself hoping he would find peace.

The bulk of this book takes place at Hearst’s residence at San Simeon, where Kristjan serves as a butler. That added a little to it for me because I remember visiting that place as a child - what an absurd display of opulence! But it was a different time.

I see that most people are less enthusiastic about this book, but I recommend it. You do have to go into it understanding that people are who they are and even deeply flawed people have a good side.

[Karolina · Rating 4 out of 5]

In the last pages of this book where it finishes, it starts again... This is a real sad story, mostly because it is very real. I can feel this man's guilt, and ignorance, and at the same be horribly angry with all the things he's done. The most shocking bit is reading those last pages, and realizing this is what we do, and this is what I do again and again, like this man will: Deal with a problem indirectly, being too afraid to face it, and continue running from ourselves. The devotion and forgiveness of his wife is amazing too, and I realized I'd be stuck in the same blindly hopeful cycle with someone I love. This is a book hard to rate.

[Kaylee · Rating 5 out of 5]

Oof, what an ending! I shouldn't have been surprised since it's typical Olafsson character arc, but still! Characters self-justifying choices to deal with guilt; visual foreshadowing (horses! Always horses!); and an interesting glimpse of not-so-far-removed life a few decades ago. (This book had the added benefit of including William Randolph Hearst and Marion Davies, who were fascinating in their own right.)

[Diana · Rating 5 out of 5]

I'm not sure if I've read a book that was as lyrically written as this one. Olafsson is a masterful weaver of words. It is as if he is communicating to us in the language of silk about things that are heaviest and most painful to us. It's breathtaking writing.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book reads beautifully. Tells the story about a man working as a butler for a famous man in America, looking back on his life, the family he abandoned in Iceland, the love he lost in NYC, with strong symbolism and an intriguing story. I loved it.

[Terry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Wow! One of those up-all-night-to-finish books. And then when I finished at 4:00am, I was wide awake wondering WHY?? This reminded me quite a bit of Remains of the Day.

[Lucinda · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review to come ... I am still digesting some thoughts on this fantastic book.

[Barbara Parrish · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of the best books I have ever read.

[Sindri Ágústsson · Rating 2 out of 5]

Ekkert slæm bók sem slík, bara ekki fyrir mig. Þó örugglega fyrir einhvern annan.

[Kristi · Rating 4 out of 5]

On the last page of the story of Christian ( Kristjan ) Benediktsson William Randolph Hearst says: "We all have to believe that we're decent. No matter what we have to believe that. For there are no innocents; life is full of mysteries and mistakes." First of all this is am amazing statement attributed to an extremely ruthless and controlling man. He calls Christian a good man. Hearst is, however, unaware of Christian's history of deserting his wife and four children and depriving them of a considerable amount of money. I believe the theme of the book is the personal struggle to live with his duality. Two ways in which the author demonstrates this endeavor appears in the actual changes in two elements of the writing. The first is the protagonist's name which switches from Christian and Kristjan, sometimes dependent on setting ( Iceland vs New York ) or speaker. The other changeable feature of the writing is the change from first person to third person narration. Sometimes Chistian speaks as I; at other times an unknown third party speaks of he or him. I did not notice the latter change in viewpoint until about half way through the book. I tried to see when the omniscient third party took over versus Christian speaking as I, but I could not detect a clear difference in the story line of the chapters. Usually when the main character is not "decent", it is difficult to "like". In addition to being indecent, Kristjan is also too much of a coward to allow anyone to know his secrets, acknowledge his failures and apologize for his betrayals. Yet Christian is not simply a villain. In many ways he is decent, helpful, and loyal in his hiding place at San Simeon. It is a compliment to the skill of author that he creates a character who is sufficiently complex that the reader cannot decide from chapter to chapter whether to admire or despise Kristjan. This is an eminently readable book. Christian and his life are full of mysteries and mistakes. Kristi & Abby Tabby

[Jens · Rating 5 out of 5]

Our narrator is the newspaper magnate Hearst's Icelandic butler Kristjan, who takes care of things at his "Chief's" enormous manion near the California coast in the 1930s. Between his many tasks, he writes letters to the wife he left in Iceland, and we learn a lot about his past (and hers).

Kristjan is unreliable, and we discover very slowly what happened in Copenhagen, Reykjavik, New York City, and San Simeon, California. We learn what kind of man he is, and why he did what he did.

I loved every page of this book, the slow journey into Kristjan's mind and his history, the glimpses into the life of the super-rich that are very different from his own - and yet have a lot of things in common.
Some parts reminded me of Max Frisch's novel Homo Faber, but this is a book review and not a college essay, so I'll spare you my pseudo-intellectual commentary.

While Kristjan is certainly not a role model, the deep-dive into his life, past and present, was fascinating, capticatingly written, and kept me turning the pages. They flew by very fast: The chapters are very short, and each one starts only in the middle of the page, so there is a lot of blank space. A metaphor for our own sins? Who knows...

A wonderful book that I will remember for a long time. Another random find at a used bookstore - another reason to visit one every now and then.

[Lavonne · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first book by this author that I have read and I couldn't put it down even though it was emotionally dark during this dark time in America & the world. The story was delivered primarily from one person's point of view through letters or memories/events. The story of Christian/Kristjan's life drew me in and captured my interest through the highs and lows of his experiences and emotions. As with everyone, singular decisions have the ability to totally change the direction of a person's life and, by default, those within their circles. Birds are intertwined throughout & I need to continue to think about their significance.

One of my favorite sentences is from page 241: "There is a corner of the soul where the shadows dwell."

Looking forward to more of his novels. Would welcome suggestions.

[Carolyn Crocker · Rating 3 out of 5]

William Randolph Hearst's butler of nearly twenty years, haunted Icelander Krystjan Benediktsson, reflects on his own life's story as the Hearst empire collapses around him. This novel in all its wanderings is a study in the passive life of a man desperate to be anonymous, whose connection to the birds he draws in his spare time hints at his dreams. Not my favorite of Olafsson's novels.


"I was part of this life, in the midst of it, and no one doubted my right to be there, no one asked who I was, no one looked askance at me." p. 67

"I remember once I had been watching a hummingbird for weeks, but when I sat down to draw it, all that emerged from my pencil was a meadow pipit. I was taken aback, I hadn't set eyes on one for years." p.231

[John · Rating 3 out of 5]

A sad story about a man (Christian Benediktsson) who, without notice, leaves his wife and four children in Iceland by 'walking into the night' to begin a new life in America.

We all understand that the decisions we make in our lives have consequences. For Christian, the consequence of his decision to leave his family is an unfulfilled life that is burdened with guilt.

Readers who like novels that have happy endings and answers to unresolved questions may be disappointed with this book; however, the beautiful prose of Olaf Olafsson provided this reader with a rich experience and I look forward to reading more of his works.

[Linda · Rating 4 out of 5]

A haunting, atmospheric and profoundly sad story which, although it started rather slowly, soon became gripping. The frequent shifting between first and third person narrative was skillfully managed and added to the increasing build-up of tension. The powerful imagery, largely created by the author's rather spare writing style, made me feel engaged with the characters, even those I didn't particularly like! The only thing I struggled with was the author's use of real-life people (William Randolph Hearst & Marian Davies) as central characters in this work of fiction. I found this a rather irritating distraction, one which detracted from my overall enjoyment of the story.

[Ann · Rating 3 out of 5]

I read The Journey Home years ago and was very moved. This too, has the power to put you in a mood for days.
Christian Benediktsson, William Randolph Hearst's butler, is a man who's life is all about running away. From his wife and children. We don't learn exactly what causes him to run but his work as butler on the eccentric Hearst's magnificent estate keeps him from facing his own demons.
The never mailed letters he writes to the wife and children he abandoned give insight into his guilt about his actions.
This book is beautiful and touching but left me wanting more.

[Marc Dilliën · Rating 3 out of 5]

Een wat klassiek verhaal, man verlaat vrouw en kinderen voor een bevlieging met een jonge danseres.
Niet erg indien goed en origineel uitgewerkt en daar schort wat aan, de lezer krijgt een goed inzicht in de leefwereld van het mannelijk hoofdpersonage maar zijn echtgenote en vooral zijn kinderen blijven voor mij bordkartonnen personages zonder veel vlees op de botten.
De finale is wat geforceerd en loopt uit in een open einde, nou ja !
Ik blijf wat op mijn honger na eerdere beklijven romans van de auteur.